#12 - Letter to the Editor: Your article on effective

[raye]

I got this practice test from the take-home practice section of the PowerScore website.

This question completely confused me. I didn't even know where to begin on how to eliminate answer choices and get to the right answer choice. If there is someone who wouldn't mind walking me through this, I would appreciate it greatly. Thanks in advance!

[David Boyle]

I got this practice test from the take-home practice section of the PowerScore website.

This question completely confused me. I didn't even know where to begin on how to eliminate answer choices and get to the right answer choice. If there is someone who wouldn't mind walking me through this, I would appreciate it greatly. Thanks in advance!

Hello Raye,

Careful reading is one important aspect of Logical Reasoning: and paraphrasing and/or prephrasing can work well. --The stimulus shows, if I may paraphrase, that Roach Ender (ha ha), with vexone, is devastating against over 4000 types of North American cockroaches. Looking through the answer choices, the only one that does NOT conflict with this is C, "Every species of cockroach that infests North America can be controlled by vexone", which is positive towards vexone. All the other answer choices insult vexone and question its effectiveness, or do something else negative. E.g., choice E says that Roach Ender was NOT tested against MORE than 4000 species.

Hope that helps,

David

[raye]

Ah! That makes a lot of sense. Thank you very much for your help!

[jewb4lawyer]

How does E contradict?
It doesn't say explicitly that Roach Ender was tested against more than 4000 species. They just have well documented studies to prove that.

[Brook Miscoski]

lawyer,

The letter writer claims that vexone is effective against all of the cockroach species, of which there are more than 4,000 (see first sentence of the stimulus). If Roach Ender was tested against exactly 4,000 species, some were left out. That conflicts directly with the letter writer's claim that vexone is proven to work against all species.

Although that is the correct analysis, I will admit that it is extremely easy to miss it. Here, (C) is unambiguously supportive of the letter writer's position. Even if you are struggling to eliminate a choice like (E), you can confidently pick (C), something to keep in mind as you develop your overall test pace strategy.